A sonic extravaganza: Alex Paxton's Candyfolk Spacedrum demonstrates his gift for carefully crafted music that has the energy & engagement of a communal jam session.

Alex Paxton: Candyfolk Spacedrum: Alex Paxton, Jennifer Walshe, Riot Ensemble, Dreammusics Ensemble, London Sinfonietta, Belham Primary School, David Ingamells, Jennifer Walshe; Jonah Records
Reviewed 25 March 2026

A sonic extravaganza where Paxton demonstrates not only his remarkable ear for creating richly layered textures where sophisticated hyperactivity dominates, but also a gift for carefully crafted music that has all the energy and engagement of a communal jam session.

Candyfolk Spacedrum is the latest aural extravaganza from composer Alex Paxton. The album, on Jonah Records, features performances from Riot Ensemble, Dreammusics Ensemble, and London Sinfonietta with pieces originally commissioned by the London Sinfonietta, WDR Symphony Orchestra, Riot Ensemble and Zubin Kanga.

First comes Blue Chew Cheerio Earpiece, eight hyperactive movements performed by Riot Ensemble. Things begin in bright, light, 1950s, hyperactive fashion. Paxton continues this vein, varying the material but always multi-layering wildly different lines, including lurching changes of direction. Inspired by sample culture, cartoons and the fragmented listening experience of the internet and 90’s pirate radio adverts, the music channels dance music energy. Something that Paxton does brilliantly well. Despite sounding sampled, the music is fully written out as Paxton likes to keep the decision-making to himself. But there are pause points in the hyperactivity, so that YOUR MOM Still Laughing features moments that are slowed down, dreamy and almost spaced out.

Pullback Hat Biome Dunk features vocalist Jennifer Walshe and Paxton's trombone improvising with Dreammusics Orchestra. Here, the orchestral part is entirely notated and just the solo parts are improvised. There is something orgasmic about the textures that Paxton conjures with his vibrant trombone over an already rich mix of layers, and only gradually does Walshe appear and begin to dominate in a disturbing fashion.

Alex Paxton: Candyfolk Space Drum - children of Belham Primary School (Photo: Orlando Gili)

Warm hearted & with a twinkle in his eye: The Brook Street Band bring out the sense of enjoyment in the violin sonatas of Ipswich-based Joseph Gibbs

Joseph Gibbs: 8 Sonatas for Violin and Basso Continuo, Op. 1; The Brook Street Band; First Hand Records

Warm and characterful music that deserves to be better known. Provincial in fact but not in reputation, the music of Joseph Gibbs endears itself in these lovely performances. 

Until the mid-20th century, Ipswich-based composer Joseph Gibbs's biggest claim to fame was probably that in 1755 Thomas Gainsborough painted his portrait. And arguably, it is the existence of this portrait which raised interest in Gibbs's music. The Brook Street Band has been playing, enjoying and loving Joseph Gibbs's violin sonatas for almost as long as the ensemble has been in existence, approaching 30 years now.  They have finally brought them to the recording studio in what is clearly a passion project.

The Brook Street Band (Rachel Harris, Tatty Theo, Carolyn Gibley) perform Joseph Gibbs's 8 Sonatas for Violin and Basso Continuo, Op. 1 on First Hand Records. The first complete recording of the works.

So, who was Joseph Gibbs? Well, simply, not a lot is known about him. Aside from a few organ pieces, we know of only two sets of music, the c. 1746 Eight Solos for a Violin with a Thorough Bass, Op. 1 and a set of Six Quartettos for Two Violins, Tenor and Violoncello or Harpsichord, Op. 2 from 1777. Both were published by subscription, and included notable musical names of the times indicating Gibbs’s recognition and popularity extended far beyond East Anglia, even though we have no evidence for Gibbs leaving the area once established in his adult life.

Mozart the Travelling Whirlwind: the fourth of pianist Michael Wessel's exploration of Mozart's piano sonatas

Mozart the Travelling Whirlwind - Mozart: Sonatas Nos. 7, 8, 9;  Michael Wessel; ARS Produktion
Reviewed by Rey Andreas 27 March 2026

German pianist Michael Wessel recorded a new album of Mozart’s piano sonatas for the ARS label in 2025. Titled Mozart The Travelling Whirlwind, the album features Sonatas Nos. 7, 8, and 9 (K 309, 311, and 310, respectively), as well as a Siciliana and sonata movements (Sonatensätze in German). 

While his first sonata is marked as much by pianistic virtuosity as by an almost exuberant joy, some of its eighth notes—particularly in its final movement, Rondeau, Allegretto grazioso—suggest a more anxious and desperate mood. Could this exaggerated joy, intense in its expression, be nothing more than a headlong rush?

This gap between the greatest joy and the deepest sorrow, this tension between these two opposing emotions—which constantly narrows without ever closing—reaches its peak in Sonata No. 9, composed in Paris. It would undoubtedly be too easy to attribute this sonata to the death of his mother, which occurred shortly before its composition. Perhaps this death merely provided an opportunity for this anxiety within Mozart to reveal itself more openly….

In any case, the pianist succeeds here in interpreting these works as the little sisters of Mozart’s most tragic operas—obviously the three operas with Da Ponte, but also, earlier, Mitridate and Lucio Silla.
The quality of this recording lies in the interplay—one might even say the interplay—between lightness and gravity, which prevents the former from becoming frivolous and the latter from becoming too sombre.

All of Mozart is right there…

Wolfgang Amadeus MOZART (1756-1791)
Piano Sonata number 7 in C major KV 309 (Mannheim 1777) 
Piano Sonata number 8 in D major KV 311 (Mannheim 1777/78) 
Piano Sonata number 9 in A minor KV 310 (Paris 1778) 
Taken from the notebook of the 8 years old Mozart:
     Sonata movement in G major, KV 15p 
    Siciliana in D major KV 15u
Sonata movement in B-flat major KV 400 / 372a (1781)
Michael Wessel (piano)

ARS Produktion ARS 38 378 1CD [74:53]

Michael Wessel is professor of piano, song interpretation and methodology at the University of Church Music in Bayreuth. He studied piano, composition, music theory and school music at the music universities of Detmold and Stuttgart, and his teachers included Elisabeth Leonskaja and the composer Helmut Lachenmann. In the years leading up to his death, Wessel often sought artistic advice from the Paul Badura-Skoda, who wrote: "Michael Wessel is not only an excellent, sensitive pianist, but also one of the most intelligent musicians I have ever met."

This disc is the fourth of Michael Wessel's Mozart discs for ARS, each with a particular theme. Previous discs being Mozart The Poet, Mozart the Double-Faced and Mozart the Progressive

Letter from Florida: Robert J Carreras experiences Peter Lieberson's 'vehicle through which to reflect a different face in love’s mirror'

Peter Lieberson: Neruda Songs - Kelley O'Connor, New World Symphony, Stephane Deneve (Photo: Alex Markow, courtesy of New World Symphony)

Ravel: Daphnis & Chloe, Lieberson: Neruda Songs; Kelley O'Connor, New World Symphony, Stephane Deneve; Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts Miami, Florida
Reviewed by Robert J Carreras, 7 March 2026

Robert J Carreras has thoughts about the meaning of home after experiencing Peter Lieberson's Neruda Songs and Ravel's complete Daphnis & Chloe from Stephane Deneve and the New World Symphony in Miami 

It is just as well that Peter Lieberson’s Neruda Songs is almost single-handedly kept playing by Kelley O’Connor. It is just as well that her portraits of this work have remained steady across time. In 2028, it will be twenty years since the composer trained O’Conner in this music at his home in Hawaii.

O’Connor’s performance of Neruda Songs may be more informed by the years that have passed and life experience, but still comes across as quite fresh. By and large, her work in these songs has stayed near to the composer’s home, and he would have it no other way.

Kelley O’Connor’s gently assumed, creamy mezzo and proficiency in Peter Lieberson’s musical idiom – a smoldering mix of melodic mazes and rhythmic lazes – translates into observing the most intimate scenes of a relationship. Lieberson wants to keep every moment alive and vital with his darling Lorraine – every note, every measure, every word is precious.

O’Conner makes native Spanish speakers reevaluate their use of common words (sueno, porque, ojos, lejos), making subliminally seductive even those perfunctory in daily speech. Stephane Deneve aides in accenting words at crucial points by stretching out rhythmic values – knowing O’Connor would not object, and that New World Symphony (NWS) was well-prepared to execute; they doubled these efforts later for Ravel.

Seductive & expressive: for their disc on SOMM, Time Stands Still, tenor Kieran White & lutenist Cédric Meyer refocus the soundworld of Dowland & Danyel

Time stands still: Dowland & Danyel; Kieran White, Cédric Meyer; SOMM
Reviewed 24 March 2026

Two great lute-song contemporaries given a striking new focus by haute-contre Kieran White and lutenist Cédric Meyer, rethinking instruments and keys to create a seductive and expressive new sound-world

A new disc from tenor Kieran White and lutenist Cédric Meyer on SOMM records, Time Stands Still, pairs the songs of John Dowland (1563 - 1626) with those of his almost exact contemporary, John Danyel with selections from Dowlands three books of airs, and A Musicall Banquet, alongside songs from Danyel's Songs for the Lute, Viol and Voice and Mrs M.E. her funeral tears for the death of her husband.

When it comes to the songs for voice and lute by Dowland and others, our contemporary performance style is very informed by the rediscovery of this music in the 20th century. Countertenor Alfred Deller's performances of Dowland were seen to distil the very essence of the melancholy of the 17th century English song. Performances like Deller's became the epitome of how these songs sounded. The reality is of course that we have no real idea what Dowland's songs sounded like to the composer himself and each modern performer has, to a certain extent, to find their own way.

In A history of singing by John Potter and Neil Sorrell, they go as far as to suggest that if Dowland was performing his songs to his own accompaniment he would probably have sounded far more like Sting than a contemporary classical singer, thanks to the changes in vocal production. A sobering thought!

Kieran White is a British tenor whose voice leads him into the French haut-contre repertoire, and he has performed leading roles in a number of Rameau's operas including Castor in Castor et Pollux, Hippolyte in Hippolyte et Aricie, Valère and Tacmas in Les Indes Galantes. We caught him in Hippolyte et Aricie at Grimeborn back in 2019 [see my review] and more recently he was singing Céphale in Élisabeth Jacquet de La Guerre's Céphale et Procris also at Grimeborn [see our review]. Of course his repertoire is wider than this. Last year he recorded a disc of 17th century Italian music, Cupid's Ground Bass with soprano Lucine Musaelian and the Bellot Ensemble [see my review].

For this disc of Dowland and Danyel, White and Meyer have chosen to take a distinctive approach to the music. They perform the music a whole tone higher than the original keys, suiting White's specific voice type. Meyer's lute is therefore tuned up from standard pitch so that it transposes from the original tablatures. The instrument is based on an extant Italian lute from 1592. The vibrating string length is slightly shortened in order to function at the new pitch, and the woods were chosen to match White’s voice quality. The intention was to lend a new, personal touch to the sonic relationship between voice and lute.

Divine Impresario - Nicolini on Stage: countertenor Randall Scotting explores the musical world of the first major castrato to sing in London

Divine Impresario: Nicolini on Stage: Broschi, Gasparini, Handel, Porpora, Mancini, Ariosto, Giaj; Randall Scotting, Mary Bevan, Academy of Ancient Music, Laurence Cummings; Signum Classics
Reviewed 3 March 2026

The first major castrato to sing in London who wowed audiences with his performances, Nicolini is an intriguing figure and on this disc Randall Scotting weaves a fascinating selection of arias written for Nicolini into an engaging recital

If you refer to an 18th century castrato then the likelihood is the first name to come time mind will be Farinelli who caused a sensation during his lifetime and whose reputation remains. But there were others, and the first to cause a stir in London, singing in the first complete Italian opera there, was Nicolò Grimaldi known as Nicolini. In London, Nicolini is associated with his roles for Handel: the title roles in Rinaldo (in 1711) and Amadigi di Gaula (in 1715). But he was more than simply a singer, being involved in the operas themselves.

It is these aspects of Nicolini's career that countertenor Randall Scotting's new disc on Signum Classics, Divine Impresario: Nicolini on Stage seeks to illuminate. Joined by soprano Mary Bevan, the Academy of Ancient Music and Laurence Cummings, Scotting performs music from Broschi's Idaspe (Venice, 1730), Gasparini's Ambleto (London, 1712), Handel's Rinaldo (London, 1711), Porpora's Siface (Venice, 1726), Handel's Amadigi (London, 1715), Gasparini's Antioco (London, 1711), Mancini's Idaspe Fedele (London 1710), Ariosto's Tito Manlio (London, 1717), Gasparini's Tomiri (London, 1709), and Giaj's Mitridate (Venice, 1729).

Nicolini made his debut in London with Scarlatti's Pirro e Demetrio which had nearly 60 performances between 1708 and 1717. Another early success was Mancini's Idaspe fedele, where Nicolini wowed audiences with a scene where, wearing a flesh-coloured bodysuit, he wrestled with a lion. A scene so popular it had to be encored. Nicolini had brought the score of Idaspe with him to London, but it was adapted for London according to his wishes with the music arranged by Johann Christoph Pepusch (of Threepenny Opera fame). 

Nicolini had created the role of Idaspe in Mancini's Idaspe fedele in 1705, so when he came to London the opera was clearly a favourite he wanted to revive. And still, in 1730 in Venice he would return to the role of Idaspe for the fourth time, this time in Ricardo Broschi's Idaspe (originally written for Broschi's brother, Farinelli).

Painting of a rehearsal for Scarlatti’s Pirro e Demetrio by the Venetian master Marco Ricci from around 1709; Nicolini stands poised at the center of the scene.

Opera historian Angus Heriot claims that with his arrival in London, Nicolini was "perhaps more than any other single person responsible for the popularity of Italian opera in England". Nicolini was based in London from 1708 to 1712, then for the next four years he iterated between Italy and London, returning for Handel's Amadigi and Ariosti's Tito manlio. By the 1720s he is a somewhat mature, more elder-statesman performing in Europe but seems to have had something of a golden season in Venice in 1729 and 1730. The disc reflects these two, the London operas and the late Venetian ones.

Double, Double Toil & Trouble: the recorder quartet Palisander explore 900 years of music inspired by the mystical and magical

Double, Double Toil & Trouble : Palisander 
Reviewed 24 February 2025

An engaging look at music for recorder inspired by the mystical and magical spanning 900 years from Hildegard of Bingen through to the winner of the BBC Radio 3/National Centre for Early Music for the 2021 Young Composers’ Award

Having given us a debut disc broadly inspired by the idea of tarantism, the latest disc from recorder quartet, Palisander (Tabea Debus, Lydia Gosnell, Miriam Monaghan & Caoimhe de Paor), Double, Double Toil & Trouble is equally imaginative. With repertoire spanning some 600 years, the disc is inspired by the mystical and magical. 

There are modern versions of traditional pieces alongside music by Hildegard of Bingen, Diego Ortiz, Cipriano de Rore, Maddelena Casulana, Anthony Holborne Sweelinck, Bach, Tartini, and a suite from Purcell's The Fairy Queen, plus Kepler's Planets by Miriam Monaghan who plays with the group, and the winner of the BBC Radio 3/National Centre for Early Music for the 2021 Young Composers’ Award (18-25 Category), Kagura Suite by Delyth Field.

Ethel Smyth's String Trio on Solaire records: Trio d'Iroise draw our focus onto this neglected piece

Ethel Smyth: String Trio in D Major, Op. 6; Trio d'Iroise; Solaire Records
Reviewed 2 February 2026

Smyth's early and relatively unknown string trio is the focus for the engaging yet sophisticated EP where the players' style and sophistication draw you in

For the second of Solaire records new series of EPs they turn to relatively unusual 19th century repertoire as Trio d'Iroise (Sophie Pantzier, Violin, François Lefèvre, Viola, Johann Caspar Wedell, Cello) perform Ethel Smyth's String Trio.

The German-French Trio d'Iroise was founded by Sophie Pantzier, Francois Lefèvre and Johann Caspar Wedell in the summer of 2017 at the Rencontres musicales d'Iroise chamber music festival in Brittany. Sophie Pantzier and François Lefèvre are members of the NDR Radiophilharmonie, Caspar Wedell is solo cellist of the ensemble reflektor. Previously on Solaire, the trio joined forces with the Syriab Trio for a fascinating synthesis of Bach and Arab music in Goldberg [see my review].

The trio was composed in 1884 when Smyth was 26, but not performed until 2008! Smyth would not write her first opera, Fantasio, until 1892-94 (premiered 1898) and a lot of her early music focuses on chamber music and song. Whilst her period studying at the Leipzig Conservatoire left her disillusioned she remained attached to Leipzig and her private studies with Heinrich von Herzogenberg would bring her contact with Clara Schumann and Brahms. Von Herzogenberg's wife Elizabeth von Stockhausen, who would become a friend of Smyth's, was a pupil of Brahms and the composer corresponded extensively with the couple. Elizabeth von Stockhausen introduced Smyth to her sister, Julia and Julia's husband, Henry Bennet Brewster (HB). He was the philosopher and poet who became a friend, mentor and perhaps lover to Smyth and would be involved in creating her operas. 

Anonymous no more: Seven uncredited 16th century works from a choirbook created in Arundel & now residing in Lambeth, here given voice for the first time

The Lambeth Anonymous:  Recordings from the Arundel Choirbook; Iken Scholars, Matthew Dunn; RUBICON
Reviewed 3 February 2026

Seven anonymous, hitherto unrecorded works from the Arundel Choirbook now in Lambeth Palace Library now given voice by this group of young singers in a most engaging and illuminating way

Thanks to the vagaries of history, the sources of the music on this lovely disc bandy around rather a variety of names. A pair of choirbooks were likely produced at Arundel College in Sussex in the early 16th century. The college was dissolved in the reign of Henry VIII, but the site was acquired by the Earl of Arundel and has had a variety of uses since.

One of the Arundel choirbooks is now housed in Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, and is hence known as the Caius Choirbook though the contents relate to Arundel. The manuscript is an important source for works by Robert Fayrfax and Nicholas Ludford. The other Arundel choirbook is now housed in Lambeth Palace Library and variously known as the Arundel Choirbook and the Lambeth Choirbook. With me so far?

The Arundel (Lambeth) and the Caius Choirbooks are linked by significantly overlapping repertoire, similar exceptional size and layout, and shared scribe. More recently, a manuscript roll was discovered in Arundel Castle, written by the same scribe and containing music by Ludford. It is believed the Caius Choirbook was a presentation copy from Arundel College to St Stephen’s, Westminster (from whence it ended up at Gonville and Caius), while the Arundel (Lambeth) Choirbook remained at the college and is thought to have been used in services there before making its way to Lambeth Palace in the late 16th or early 17th century.

Robert Fayrfax and Nicholas Ludford contributed at least ten of the nineteen pieces in the Arundel (Lambeth) Choirbook and there are seven anonymous pieces. It is with these seven anonymous works that this disc is concerned.

On the disc, The Lambeth Anonymous, from Rubicon, Matthew Dunn conducts the Iken Scholars in Salve Regina, Ave dei patris filia, Vidi aquam egredientem, Ave mundi spes Maria, Gaude flore virginali and two Magnificats from the Arundel (Lambeth) Choirbook, all anonymous. Recorded in what was likely the 500th anniversary of the creation of the choirbook, the recording took place in the chapel at Lambeth Palace. The works cover four votive antiphons to Mary, and an antiphon for Eastertide as well as the Magnificats. They are nestled in the choirbook between mass settings by Fayrfax and Ludford on either side and followed by three other Marian devotional pieces by Walter Lambe, Fayrfax and Edmund Sturton.

Reviving the Queen of Sheba: American Romantics record a suite from Goldmark's once-popular first opera

Goldmark: The Queen of Sheba Suite; American Romantics, Kevin Sherwin
Reviewed 26 January 2026

Highly popular during his lifetime and up until the 1930s, Goldmark's first opera has languished rather. Here revived in an abbreviated concert suite, American Romantics give us a lovely taste of the opera's melodic charms and ingratiating manner 

Composer Karl Goldmark remains known if at all, for his Rustic Wedding Symphony. Born Károly Goldmark in 1830, his father was a cantor to the Jewish congregation at Keszthely in Hungary. Moving to Vienna in 1844 to study at the Vienna Conservatory, he found himself on his own after 1848 when the Revolution of 1848 forced the Conservatory to close down. Goldmark was largely self-taught as a composer and survived doing menial jobs, eventually becoming a member of Vienna's Carl Theatre in 1850. He also pursued a side career as a music journalist. Johannes Brahms and Goldmark developed a friendship as Goldmark's prominence in Vienna grew.

His output includes symphonies, concertos, and seven operas. His first opera, Die Königin von Saba (The Queen of Sheba) remains his best known and the work was celebrated during his lifetime and for some years thereafter. Though he had begun it in 1860, it was not premiered in Vienna until 1875. The work proved so popular that it remained in the repertoire of the Vienna Staatsoper continuously until 1938, clocking up some 250 stagings in Vienna alone.

Goldmark's footprint on disc remains relatively frustrating. You can find his Wedding Symphony, a disc of Symphonic Poems and his Violin Concerto No. 1 (paired with that of Korngold). Die Königin von Saba has been recorded: 

• a live 1970 performance of the work by the American Opera Society Orchestra conducted by Reynald Giovaninetti with Arley Reece as Assad and Alpha Floyd as the Queen of Sheba
• a 1980 studio recording by the Hungarian State Opera, conducted by Ádám Fischer with Siegfried Jerusalem as Assad and Klara Takács at the Queen of Sheba on Hungaraton 
• Oper Freiburg on CPO from 2016

However, it does not seem to be easily available, and the opera has slipped down the cracks. 

A satisfying recital in so many ways: Katie Bray & William Vann explore the whole of Kurt Weill - In Search of Youkali

In search of Youkali: The songs of Kurt Weill; Katie Bray, William Vann, Murray Grainger, Marianne Schofield; CHANDOS
Reviewed 20 January 2026

A profoundly satisfying and intelligently put together recital tracing Weill from Weimar Germany to pre-War Paris to American and Broadway. The songs all beautifully performed, capturing the essence of style and never losing sight of the words or Weill's music 

After Kurt Weill's death in 1950, his widow Lotte Lenya devoted time to resurrecting Weill's music, notably the works written in Germany including scores which had been lost. She was persuaded to sing the songs, including taking the role of Jenny in Mark Blitzstein's English version of The Threepenny Opera. But her voice had deepened considerably and limitations meant that she used a lot more sprechstimme than Weill himself might have imagined. This led to a cabaret-style of performance in Weill's music, notably the works with Brecht, which became almost standard. Weill himself saw no difference between his German and his American works, viewing the whole as a continuum.

The challenge of performing Weill nowadays is exemplified by Nanna's Lied (words by Brecht), written for Lotte Lenya, but she never sang it in public though there are records of private performances. It is a song, it needs to be sung, yet also needs that attention to the words that all of Weill's Brecht settings do.

I first heard mezzo-soprano Katie Bray singing Kurt Weill with pianist William Vann in 2019 at Pizza Express in Chelsea [see my review], and we caught the pair in a similar programme at the Oxford Lieder Festival in 2021 [see my review]. Now this programme, suitably matured has been caught on disc with In search of Youkali: the songs of Kurt Weill on Chandos where Bray and Vann are joined by Murray Grainger (accordion) and Marianne Schofield (double bass). 

The programme uses Youkali, a tango-habanera that began life as an instrumental for the play Marie Galante in 1934 (with Weill then in Paris) before being turned into a song, the music reappearing in the 1935 operetta Der Kuhandel as well as the early American musical Johnny Johnston (1936). The song is about a land of lost content, and Bray and Vann use this as a sort of emblem, the programme being linked by four short improvisations on Youkali before we hear the song at the end. In a way it is emblematic of Weill's own journey towards a musical ideal.

Enjoying it for its own sake: there is much we don't know about 17th-century Exeter organist John Lugge but on this new disc William Whitehead leaves us engaged & intrigued

The Forbidden Fruit: organ music by John Lugge; William Whitehead; Editions Hortus
Reviewed 15 December 2025

Using a French organ that provides a sound world as close as we can get to early 17th century Exeter, William Whitehead explores the organ music of John Lugge, by turns fascinating, dazzling and imaginative. We don't know much about the composer, but his music is well worth investigating.

17th-century composer and organist John Lugge is not a well known name, and his organ music was written for a type of instrument that no longer exists in England. For this new disc from Editions Hortus, Forbidden Fruit, organist William Whitehead travelled to Bolbec in Normandy, France to record a selection of John Lugge's surviving works, ten of his plainchant-based pieces and three of his free voluntaries, early examples of the so-called 'double voluntary'.

We don't actually know that much about John Lugge. Born in Barnstaple in 1580, the son of a shoe-maker, he first shows up in the historical record in 1602 as Organist at Exeter Cathedral where he remains until 1647 after which it is presumed he must have died. There is no record of his early musical training or experience, though stylistically his music can be linked to that of composers from the Chapel Royal including John Bull and Whitehead's article in the CD booklet points out that Arthur Cocke, Exeter Cathedral's Organist from 1689 was appointed to the Chapel Royal in 1601.

Lugge was highly regarded, being described as a 'rare organist' by one Lieutenant Harrison in 1635. As to the instrument Lugge was playing, well Whitehead has needed to look abroad to find something suitable. When it comes to two (or more) manual instruments in the UK, very little remains intact on any scale from before the 18th century, and we know that in the 1630s Exeter had a particularly splendid organ. The organ at Saint-Michel de Bolbec was originally built in 1630 by the organ builder William Lesley (Guillaume Leslie) for a church in Rouen. Lesley was Scots but based in Rouen. The organ was enlarged in 1728-30 and moved to Bolbec in 1792. There were 19th-century interventions, but the 1999 restoration took it back to its 1792 state. It has pipework contemporary with Lugge, retains its four keyboards and a 30-note "à la Française" pedalboard, and is tuned to an uneven temperament (Savior, 1701).

The disc begins with ten of Lugge's plainchant-based voluntaries, six Gloria tibi trinitas, Christe qui lux, Miserere, In nomine and Ut re mi fa sol la. This was a genre that developed during the 16th century when the organist would play chant-based voluntaries alternating with the sung chant. This would hardly be happening in Exeter in the 17th century when the Reformation was in full swing, so it is not clear why Lugge wrote these works which hark back to the work of organists like Tallis, Byrd and Bull. 

Powerful & intense: the music of Elena Firsova & Dmitri Smirnov reflects their friendship with Rudersdal Chamber Players but also links back to Schnittke, Gubaidulina & Denisov

Love and Loss: Elena Firsova, Dmitri Smirnov; Rudersdal Chamber Players; OUR Recordings
Reviewed 15 December 2025

The Danish contemporary music ensemble pays tribute to its friendship with Elena Firsova and Dmitri Smirnov with a programme of powerful and uncompromising yet surprisingly lyrical music

There is a fascinating transnational quality to Love and Loss on OUR Recordings. Performed by Rudersdal Chamber Players, one of the Nordic region’s leading ensembles for contemporary music. The disc represents a special tribute to their friendship with the composers, Elena Firsova and Dmitri Smirnov, which dates back to 2019. Both born in Russia, Firsova and Smirnov met and fell in love while studying at the Moscow Conservatoire, but despite some success they ran afoul of officialdom and were denounced as members of The Seven, a group of non-conforming composers that included Denisov, Firsova, Smirnov, and Gubaidulina, at the 6th Congress of the Union of Soviet Composers. They moved to England in 1991, and their daughter is Russian-British composer Alissa Firsova.

Founded in 2017 by violinist Christine Pryn at the suggestion of Russian-American composer Lera Auerbach, Rudersdal Chamber Players has become the ensemble-in-residence at Rudersdal Sommerkoncerter based in the Danish municipality of Rudersdal some 20 kim north of Copenhagen. The core of the ensemble is a piano quartet, but the instrumentation is flexible and can be adapted to suit different venues and programmes and on this disc we hear Jonas Frølund, clarinet, Christine Pryn, violin, Marie Stockmarr Becker, viola, John Ehde, cello, and Manuel Esperilla, piano.

Challenges & rewards: Tredegar Town Band celebrates the brass music of Robin Stevens with Brass Odyssey

Robin Stevens: Brass Band Odyssey, Mancunian Fanfare and other works; Tredegar Town Band, Ian Porthouse; World of Sound
Reviewed 9 December 2025

Not a brass player himself, Robin Stevens' music revels in the challenges of writing for brass band and Tredegar Town Band do him proud on this new disc

Composer Robin Stevens studied at the Royal Northern College of Music and at Birmingham University with John Joubert. A cellist and teacher by trade, debilitating illness took him out of circulation for 17 years. Thankfully fully recovered, he has devoted himself to composition since 2017.

This new disc from Tredegar Town Band and Ian Porthouse on World of Sound showcases Robin Stevens' writing for brass band and for brass instruments. In his introduction in the CD booklet, Stevens is candid about the challenges of writing for brass instruments and brass band: "a composer writing for an instrumental family outside his or her comfort zone can, potentially at least, bring an unorthodox freshness of approach which is conducive to creative energy and vitality. As a music-college-trained cellist myself it is a common experience for me to present a wind or brass player with a challenging and unconventional passage and be received with an initial frown or two: then, with goodwill and give and take on both sides, adjustments are made to the passage which preserve its expressive essence, make it playable and bring into being music which, because it is not obviously idiomatic, probably would not have been conceived by a composer writing for their own instrument."

The disc opens with Brass Odyssey (from 2012-2013) for brass band and eight percussionists. The longest piece on the album, it is well over 20 minutes in duration, with Stevens structuring it in two parts, Elegy and Towards Rejoicing. It begins in a serious, bleak vein, with Stevens' use of note clusters giving density to the sound and providing an uncompromising air. There are percussion interjections, but often his use of the instruments is relatively discreet. Change comes gradually, with moments of colour and movement leading, eventually, to fanfares, yet at one point things collapse into a bleak solo. Finally, the music takes off unashamedly, with vivid, busy textures and eventually something of a swing to the rhythms, leading ultimately to a terrific clamour.

Delizie, contente: The Bellot Ensemble explore love in all its forms in 17th century Italy for Cupid's Ground Bass on FHR

Cupid's Ground Bass: Strozzi, uccelini, Farina, Cavalli, Kapsberger, Biber, Monteverdi; Lucine Musaelian, Kieran White, The Bellot Ensemble; FHR Records
Reviewed 26 November 2025

A young ensemble in one of those intelligently put together programmes where the engaging performances draw you in and with many of the items on the disc I thought 'I'd like to hear more of that!'

The Bellot Ensemble is a young period instrument ensemble that in October 2025 began a two-year term s the New Generation Baroque Ensemble with BBC Radio 3. For their debut disc on FHR (First Hand Records), Cupid's Ground Bass the group explores the sound world of 17th-century Italy through the twin mirrors of love and the ground bass. Both popular subjects for 17th-century Italian music, the disc casts its net widely with arias by Barbara Strozzi, Francesco Cavalli and Claudio Monteverdi along with instrumental music by Marco Uccellini, Carlo Farina, Giovanni Girolamo Kapsberger, and Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber. 

For the disc, the ensemble features Lucine Musaelian (soprano, viola da gamba), Kieran White (tenor), Olivia Petryszak (recorder), Edmund Taylor and Maxim Del Mar (violin), Jacob Garside (cello), Nathan Giorgetti (viola da gamba), Daniel Murphy (theorbo, baroque guitar), and Matthew Brown (harpsichord, organ). We caught Lucine Musaelian and Nathan Giorgetti, as Intesa Duo at the Handel Hendrix House back in 2023 [see my review]

What the disc is really exploring is the way that 17th-century Italian music expanded its range and freedom, yet the forms often remained. Dances and ground basses were very much the norm, yet focusing on the ground bass can be something of a challenge with a danger of everything seeming to come out of the same mould. The Bellot Ensemble's selection is both ingratiating and canny.

Poetic exploration: Ensemble Près de votre oreille in an engaging exploration of chamber & vocal music by William Lawes

Lighten mine eies - William Lawes: selected psalms & harp consorts; Ensemble Près de votre oreille, Robin Pharo; Harmonia Mundi
Reviewed 11 November 2025

For their debut on Harmonia Mundi, the young French ensemble give us a poetic exploration of the music of William Lawes putting his imaginative Harp Consorts alongside his intimate psalm settings and theatre music 

Whilst 17th-century English composer William Lawes is best known for his viol consorts and music for lyra viol, his elder brother Henry Lawes is known for his vocal music with little instrumental music surviving. This new disc, Lighten mine eies from Ensemble Près de votre oreille and Robin Pharo on Harmonia Mundi sets William Lawes instrumental works against his vocal pieces in an attractive programme that mixes movements from the Harp Consorts, psalm settings and songs.

Henry, Willliam and their younger brothers Thomas and John were born to Thomas Lawes and his wife Lucris. Thomas senior was a church musician who became a lay vicar at Salisbury Cathedral. The family lived in the Close and it is presumed that the boys all sang in the choir. Thanks to a patron, William Lawes was apprenticed to English composer John Coprario (Cooper). By 1635 William had a Court appointment but had been writing music for the Court before this. William remained at loyal courtier, writing music for King Charles and Queen Henrietta Maria both for public and private use.

Ensemble Près de votre oreille features Maïlys de Villoutreys (soprano), Anaïs Bertrand (mezzo-soprano), Alex Rosen (bass), Fiona-Emilie Poupard (violin and viola da gamba), Pernelle Marzorati (harp), Simon Waddell (theorbo), Loris Barrucand (harpsichord and organ) and Robin Pharo (viola da gamba and direction). The ensemble was founded by Robin Pharo in 2017 and previous discs have included two devoted to Elizabethan song, Come Sorrow and Blessed Echoes.

The other brother: music by Galileo Galilei's younger brother on this lovely new EP

It is now moderately well-known that the great scientist Galileo Galilei's father, Vincenzo was a fine musician and there have been music and music theatre projects linking the two such as Clare Norburn's Galileo which premiered at the Brighton Early Music Festival in 2016 [see my review]. 

In fact, the whole family seems to have been musical. Vincenzo was a lutenist and Galileo would play lute duets with his father. As a young man he assisted his father's experiments to prove that equal temperament was better than mean-tone tuning, and as his father was a member of the Florentine Camerata, whose experiments led to the development of monody and to opera, the music in Galileo's life was cutting edge. Galileo was present at, and almost certainly involved in, the creation of the Florentine Intermedi of 1589, a musico-dramatic presentation which was an important pre-cursor of opera.

But Galileo had a younger brother, Michelangelo and he was a musician too though his music is far less well-known. Echo ex iove from lutenist Israel Golani is an EP from Solaire Records (available on BandCamp) which presents six short dances by Michelangelo Galilei (1575-1631). The EP is something of a follow-up to Golani's previous disc for Solaire Records, In the Garden of Polyphony, exploration of the 16th-century French penchant for lute music, notably transcriptions of polyphonic vocal music [see my review]

Michelangelo Galilei was something of a child prodigy. His father, Vincenzo, died when Michelangelo was just sixteen and only two years later he was sent to the the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, where foreign musicians were much in demand, possibly under the wing of the powerful Lithuanian Radziwiłł family. He tried to come back to Florence, but failed to find employment at the court of the Grand Duke, however in 1607 he moved to the court of Duke Maximilian I of Bavaria where he stayed until his death. Of his eight children, three became lutenists.

Whatever musical success he had, money was clearly tight and much of his surviving correspondence with Galileo is about money. 

Most of his music is for lute, the ten-course lute and his book Il primo libro d'intavolatura di liuto was published in 1620. Israel Golani plays a suite of six dances beginning with a toccata, then corrente, passamezzo, saltarello and volta. There is an engagingly melodic quality to this music, but also a florid quality too. The suite makes a delightful EP with a lovely engaging quality to Golani's playing. I would not want a full-length disc of this music, but it would be lovely to have more.

Michelangelo Galilei: Echo ex iove - Israel Golani (lute) - Solaire Records

A new solo album from British pianist, Alexander Ullman, features a thoroughly enjoyable and entertaining selection of music by Edvard Grieg - ‘The Chopin of the North’

Edvard Grieg: Songs, Moods and Lyric Pieces; Alexander Ullman; Rubicon Classics 
Reviewed by Tony Cooper (31 October 2025)

The prize of Ullman’s album, though, is his transcription of Peer Gynt Suite, No.1, drawing out the colour of the orchestra from the piano perhaps more so than in the composer’s own version.  

First coming to international attention in 2011 after winning the Franz Liszt International Piano Competition in Budapest, Alexander Ullman has performed at such prestigious venues as Vienna’s Musikverein with the Tonkünstler Orchestra of Lower Austria under the baton of Hans Graf, the Salzburg Grosser Saal with the Mozarteum Orchestra (Patrick Hahn), the Sichuan Symphony Orchestra (Darrell Ang), Kristiansand Symfoniorkester (Julian Rachlin) and the SWR Sinfonierrchester (Joseph Bastian) whilst returning to the Sofia Philharmonic under Jonathan Bloxham.  

Other recent highlights of this globetrotting pianist include making his début at the prestigious Hamburg Elbphilharmonie, the Klavierfest Ruhr, concerto appearances with the Hong Kong Sinfonietta (under Ola Rudner), Sofia Philharmonic and Filharmonie Brno (Dennis Russell Davies), the Symphony of India Orchestra (Mikel Toms), a two-piano recital with Teo Gheorghiu at the Freiburg Festival in Switzerland while undertaken a plethora of recitals in the UK, Italy and the Netherlands.  

However, it was in the spring of 2019 that Ullman cut his first album for Rubicon featuring Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker Suite and Prokofiev’s Six Pieces from Cinderella as well as Stravinsky’s Petrushka and Firebird suites which received rave reviews. In 2022, the label released a second album featuring Franz Liszt’s first and second piano concertos along with his B minor piano sonata with the BBC Symphony Orchestra under Andrew Litton. 

Explaining the unexplainable: a seductive & magical album from Lotte Betts-Dean, Dimitris Soukaras, everything you've ever lived on Delphian

everything you've ever lived: Baden Powell, Ravel, Seiber, de Falla, Richard Rodgers, Burt Bacharach, My Brightest Diamond, Vincente Asencio, Debussy, Sinead O'Connor, Caroline Polachek, Britten, Asik Veysel, Jorge Cardoso, Paurillo Barroso, Armando Soares; Lotte Betts-Dean, Dimitris Soukaras; Delphian Records
Reviewed 1 October 2025

A mysterious and seductive recital from a voice and guitar duo that moves smoothly and hauntingly through countries, eras and styles to create a little bit of magic

There is a phrase in Megan Stellar's rather flowery booklet note for mezzo-soprano Lotte Betts-Dean's latest disc which helps to elucidate the rather elusive nature of the programme. "That melange of ambiguity and subconscious understanding lifts alongside Lotte and Dimitris's interest in harmonic connection and the subtle stories that can be told...". 

For the disc, everything you've ever lived on Delphian Records, Lotte Betts-Dean is joined by guitarist Dimitris Soukaras for a recital which moves effortlessly and nearly seamlessly through Baden Powell, Ravel, Seiber, de Falla, Richard Rodgers, Burt Bacharach, My Brightest Diamond, Vincente Asencio, Debussy, Sinead O'Connor, Caroline Polachek, Britten, Asik Veysel, Jorge Cardoso, Paurillo Barroso and Armando Soares.

The album is described as 'exploring ideas of nostalgia, childhood memory and the state between waking and sleep'. Which covers a remarkable amount of ground. What is distinctive for me is not so much the subject matter of the songs as the way one flows into another with hardly a ripple. 

This is not so much a recital of songs as a sequence, lasting just over an hour, that flows smoothly and seductively. And make no bones about it, Betts-Dean's voice, no matter the subject she is singing about, is wonderfully seductive and beautifully smooth and partnered by Soukaras' stunning guitar playing. That at least ten of the tracks on the disc are his own arrangements must be to his credit in creating the sense of coherence and flow.

everything you've ever lived - Lotte Betts-Dean & Dimitris Soukaras - Delphian Records
(Photo: foxbrushfilms.com)

Colour and movement: Clarinet concertos from Peter Cigleris and Györ Symphonic Band.

Frigyes Hidas, Simon Milton, David Maslanka, Satoshi Yagisawa; Peter Cigleris, Györ Symphonic Band, László Marosi, Ferenc Szabó; SOMM
Reviewed 9 September 2025

Four contrasting contemporary works for the intriguing combination of clarinet and wind orchestra played by a British clarinettist with a fine Hungarian ensemble

In 2021, clarinettist Peter Cigleris released Rediscovered, a disc of forgotten British clarinet concertos from the 1930s and 1940s [see my review], and his subsequent recordings on SOMM included a disc of music by Ruth Gipps, and a disc of British chamber music, Eclogue.

He is continuing his quest, but his latest disc Clarinet Concertos on SOMM casts its net rather further afield. Along with the Hungarian ensemble, Győr Symphonic Band, Cigleris has recorded four works for solo clarinet and wind orchestra, including two world-premiere recordings. These are conducted by László Marosi, the world’s foremost authority on Hungarian wind music, and Ferenc Szabó, the founder of the Györ Symphonic Band.

The concertos are Concerto Semplice by Hungarian composer Frigyes Hidas, Concerto for Clarinet and Band by British composer Simon Milton, the Concerto for Clarinet and Wind Orchestra by American composer David Maslanka, and the Clarinet Concerto by one of the leading Japanese composers of music for wind instruments, Satoshi Yagisawa. 

Györ Symphonic Band is quite a substantial ensemble with over 50 players being listed in the booklet. The disc has an excellent booklet note by Robert Matthew-Walker which presents each of the composers and their works, but fails to answer an intriguing question. What came first? Is this a disc aimed at presenting Györ Symphonic Band in a selection of diverse repertoire, or is it aimed at presenting concertos for clarinet and wind band? If this latter, Matthew-Walker's note fails to explain the fascination of this genre, why it is generally so neglected and why focus on it now? Thus, though the disc is remarkably enjoyable, there are questions hanging over it.